I started with the Cornish Finnish Michigan Pasty Recipe, then modified it to include only the fillings that Dobber’s lists on their website:  chicken, potatoes, rutabaga, carrots, celery, onion, salt, pepper, & cream of chicken sauce. However, I didn’t have any celery, so I opted to substitute the cream of chicken sauce for cream of celery soup (which took care of two ingredients!).

Fillings:
1.5 lbs of chicken (diced)
1/2 cup of diced rutabaga
5.5 cups of diced potatoes
1/3 cup of chopped carrots
1 onion, finely diced
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1 can of Cream of Celery soup

Crust:
4.5 cups of all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon of salt
1 cup of shortening (Crisco)
1.5 cups of very cold water

Here’s how to make it:

1. Whisk together flour and salt in a large bowl. Cut shortening. Make a well in the center of the mixture, and quickly stir in ice cold water. Form dough into a ball. Set aside.
2. Combine uncooked vegetables, chicken, salt, pepper, & cream of celery soup.
3. Roll out pastry dough into 6 x 8 inch rectangles. Place about 1-1.5 cups of filling in the center of each rectangle. Bring 6 inch sides together, and seal. Cut a slit in the top of each pasty. Wrap individually in tin foil. Place on baking sheets.
4. Bake at 400 degrees F (220 degrees C) for 60 minutes.

We’ll likely just drive down and explore, but I spent a little bit of time trying to figure out if there’s any must-see places to check out or restaurants to try. We plan to travel through the cities of Elkhart, Neppanee, Goshen, Shipshewana, Middlebury, & Bristol. Here’s my list, so far:

1. Heritage Trail Driving Tour - The Heritage Trail is a 90-mile rural route that circles the northern Indiana Amish community, passing through several smaller communities. There are some mp3 files that you can download (for free!) and listen to the narrative while driving along the Trail. The audio includes lots of fun facts about the area and people, and a bit of history.
2. Quilt Gardens Tour - There are 17 separate flower gardens, each one uniquely patterned to look like a quilt square. These are fairly large gardens - they vary in size, but on average I would guess that they are 40′x40′!  It’ll be tempting to bring a ladder or RC aircraft, so that I can capture some aerial photos of these gardens!
3. Linton’s Enchanted Gardens - A huge award-winning local nursery/greenhouse. They supposedly have a ton of local & exotic flora, beautiful displays, and even a petting zoo!
4. Bonneyville Mill Park, Bristol - A historic red gristmill, surrounded by a 223-acre park with a picturesque setting. They offer mill tours, and sell fresh-ground flour in the gift shop.

There are a ton of little shops & restaurants that I want to check out, but there are just too many to list. We’ll still need to plan a little more before we go, as most of the Amish businesses are closed on Sundays.

The scratched lens still works, but there’s the obvious problem with using it. The lens with the broken shutter can be sent to a repair shop & likely fixed ($150?). But my flash is dead - Eric suspects it has just reached the end of it’s life cycle, as they only have so many “flashes” before they wear out.

A few years ago, I loved just having my Nikon D-70s with a single (slow) lens & the on-board flash. The body was slightly bigger than I wanted, but it was a good first DSLR. Now, I use a D-80, and it works just fine for my purposes! I’ve tested out Eric’s D2X & D3, and I still think both of those bodies are just too big for me.

I’d really like to get some faster lenses & a new flash. I liked my SB-600, and I’ll probably replace it in kind - I don’t need something super powerful, and the smaller size is really important to me. I can’t stand using the onboard flash anymore - I hate the shadowing that it casts, since I can’t soften the light or keep the flash centered when I turn my camera sideways!

And some fast glass is also a must. My lenses are okay, and since we shoot exclusively Nikon, I can use all of Eric’s lenses - but we don’t exactly share well (especially since we often shoot together). My primary lens is a Tamron 17-50mm (1: 2.8), but it’s been rather flaky for the past couple years (the camera doesn’t recognize that it’s connected, so I constantly have to unmount & remount it). It’s tolerable for just casual photography, but it’s absolutely horrible for event & nature photography - it never fails that the moment I want to take a photo is when the camera won’t recognize the lens, and I have to take a few seconds to fix it (causing me to miss the shot!). Unfortunately, the Tamron lens retails for $460, while the Nikon version (a 17-55mm f/2.8G) is $1375. I hate using the Tamron, but I’m not sure that I want to shell out that much. Perhaps I’ll buy a 50mm or 85mm fixed lens as an interim fix?

We’ve been thinking of attempting the driveway as a DIY project. Remove the old pavement (there’s so much alligator-cracking that the driveway peels up in softball-sized chunks), dig down to put a gravel base, form it, and then pour the new concrete.

If we did the driveway ourselves, we would rent a skid steer (”bobcat”) for $300/day. It would probably take us 2 days to remove the pavement, excavating down to a depth of 11″ below finish grade (5.5″ gravel + 5.5″ concrete). The tricky part would be figuring out how to dispose of the concrete, asphalt, and dirt. Most places prefer the concrete & asphalt to be separated. Concrete is easy to get rid of, and there’s usually just a flat fee per truckload. For asphalt, the truck is usually weighed and then you pay by the ton. I would guess that we have around 40 tons of asphalt to get rid of.  I haven’t called for current pricing, but at the absolute low end it would be at least $5/ton to get rid of it (so $200, but it could be much more). We would also need to hire a dump truck & driver (since neither of us has a CDL to drive a dump truck), and that would be at least a few hundred dollars per day. For a 1-day job, it would cost us at least $800, but most likely around $1000. If it took 2 days, we’d be looking at $1300-1500, to cover the second day of equipment/truck rental.

Once we get the old pavement removed, we would set up some string lines and start placing gravel (likely 21AA crushed concrete) for a base under the driveway. The absolute minimum that I’d place would be 3″, but ideally I’d like it to be 5.5″ thick. 21AA weighs approximately 2600 lbs/cyd, so we would need  almost 40 tons of gravel. The cost through the local landscape supply place is $12/ton (plus delivery/tax). The stone base would be $500 in materials, and I think I could negotiate a delivery charge of $100-150. However, I suspect I could get it from the local concrete crushing company for much cheaper, perhaps half? They don’t usually deliver to residential, but at 40 tons that would be a full load or two (depending on their truck capacity), so they might.

We would again have to rent a skid steer to spread the gravel ($300), and then a vibratory compactor to thoroughly compact it. We could do it with a plate compactor ($70/day), but a roller ($200) would be so much easier & quicker. Including the cost of the stone, it would be around $1000 to place the base.

Once that’s complete, we would need to buy some 2×6’s($50) to form the new driveway. Then we’d be ready for concrete. At 4″ thick (which is the standard thickness for a residential driveway), it would require 20 cyds of concrete ($2000). If we go to 5.5″ or 6″ thick (desirable for heavy campers & trucks), it would be $3000 for the concrete.  There would be an additional $100 in rentals (for bull floats, vibrating screed, etc.) for finishing the concrete. I would consider paying a couple of experienced laborers to come and help finish the concrete. $500 would be enough to cover the labor for two guys (and I might be able to eliminate the equipment rental, if they have their own tools), and that would probably be well worth it. So the concrete portion would cost $2600-3700, depending on thickness.

Estimated total cost, for our driveway (DIY):
$1500, Removal
+ $1000, 21AA Base
+ $2600, 4″ Concrete  OR $3700, 6″ Concrete
= $ 5100 - $6200

So far I’ve only received one estimate, but I plan to post another entry once I’ve had a few contractors out to bid the job. I’m leaning towards having a contractor come in to handle the removal, and then doing the prep work and concrete finishing ourselves (with the help of a few hired hands). It’ll be slightly more to hire out the removal, but it’ll make it so much easier!

I suppose that should be reason enough to have the tree removed, but my biggest motivation for taking it down was to get rid of those darn whirly-birds (officially called samaras or maple keys, but also known as helicopters)… and allow my garden to be in full sunlight for most of the day!

I called around for estimates, and was shocked at the cost! Because of the tree’s location relative to the garage, house, and power lines, we wanted to hire licensed (and insured!) professionals. The first company that came out wanted $1875 (or $1750 cash), and offered an additional $300 discount if they left all the wood. The second company came in with an estimate of $1250. I put out a referral request on Facebook, and got a few recommendations - including a company that came in at $675.

Since the third company (Stewarts Tree Service) came highly recommended by a coworker, and they were (by far!) the cheapest, we went with them. I verified their insurance coverage, and about a week and a half later they came to cut down the tree. They decided to do it by climbing, which was fun to watch.

Eric took the day off work, and set up his camera to take pictures at regular intervals while they were working. Here’s the footage (uploaded to YouTube):

Tree Removal Time-Lapse

I’ll be spending time in pretty much all the ‘major’ cities:  Sault Ste. Marie, Escanaba, Iron Mountain/Kingsford, Iron River, Ironwood, Menominee, Marquette/Negaunee/Ishpeming, and of course Houghton/Calumet.

I’ve been researching local restaurants, trying to plan out as much as I can ahead of time:

• In the Soo - Antlers Restaurant, whose walls are apparently covered with stuffed animals.
• In Escanaba - The Swedish Pantry, for authentic Swedish food (though I only have IKEA to compare it to)
• In Menominee - Schloegel’s Bay View Restaurant, for German/American cuisine (and pasties!)

The following week I’ll be visiting Iron Mountain and Marquette. There’s quite a few restaurants in Marquette that have opened in the past few years, including a Cajun/Creole restaurant (with a VooDoo bar!) and an Irish Pub. I’m not sure if I’ll stop at the Cajun place, but I definitely want to try the Wild Rover for some fish & chips!

I’m open to suggestions for other restaurants to check out…

Here’s the recipe, taken from this month’s All You magazine:

• 2 Tbsp vegetable oil
• 1 stalk celery, chopped
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1-2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 can (15 oz) black beans, rinsed & drained
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• 1 Tbsp cumin
• 1/2 cup plain bread crumbs
• Salt & Pepper

1. Pre-heat oven to 375.
2. Warm oil in a skillet over medium-high.  Sauté celery, onions, & garlic (about 5 min).
3. Pour beans into a bowl and mash into a paste. Stir in sautéed vegetables, egg, bread crumbs, and seasoning. Form into 4-5 patties.
4. Place patties on a baking sheet and place in oven. Bake until firm, about 10 minutes per side.